


Don't Cry Mercy

by below_the_starry_clusters_bright



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1920s, Demonic Possession, Discussions of mental illness, F/M, Religious Themes, asylum setting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2019-10-01
Packaged: 2020-10-17 07:43:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 13,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20617439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/below_the_starry_clusters_bright/pseuds/below_the_starry_clusters_bright
Summary: Rey Jackson has always had the power to soothe agitated minds. When Father Luke Sykwalker visits her at Sister Maz's Home for Girls, Rey assumes the disturbed nephew he speaks of just needs a calming word or two. By the time she realizes that something more sinister is at play within Ben Solo's mind, the demonic entity Kylo Ren has set his sights on her.





	1. leave me in chains

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to audbooh, Celia, and Briar for their editing prowess! Thanks also to all the RFFA mods for putting together this collection. Fic title and chapter titles taken from Don't Cry Mercy by Hurts. I can only imagine the band would be baffled to find this exists.  
Hope you enjoy!

Niima, New York

1926

In the cold attic room of Sister Maz’s Home for Girls, Rey Jackson soothed a sobbing four-year-old.

“It’s alright,” Rey murmured, her voice muffled by the child’s hair. “Hush, little one, it’s alright.”

The girl, Anna, whimpered and nodded. Rey held her closer and rocked her. She breathed her usual calming words and sent out an enveloping sense of peace. Anna snuffled and swiped her eyes, her tears stemming.

“There we are,” Rey said, setting the child upright and giving her a soft pat on the shoulder. “Go on, now.”

She followed Anna’s progress across the room and spotted Sister Maz looking on from the doorway. The elderly nun ruffled Anna’s hair as she passed, and then turned back to Rey.

“Your gift is growing,” she noted.

Rey smiled. “God’s will.”

“I don’t doubt it.” Sister Maz’s own smile faded. “There’s someone I would like you to meet.”

Rey got to her feet, intrigued. Sister Maz’s Home for Girls so rarely had visitors, much to the quiet sorrow of the orphans who lived there. The few people who did come to Sister Maz’s tended to stay clear of Rey. Somehow, word had spread through the small town of Niima of her unearthly ability to ease even the most tempestuous of fits. Rey didn’t care much. The gift was a blessing in the emotional surroundings of an orphanage, where rage and despair were common even in the little girls with the most practiced manners. It was why, at nineteen years old, she was still at the Home rather than making her own way in the world.

“Father Luke is an old acquaintance of mine,” Sister Maz said as she led Rey down the stairs. “He’s visiting from Chicago.”

“A long way,” Rey said with a frown.

“He has family here. And he believes the outcome of his visit will be worth the travel time.”

The old building creaked around them. They hadn’t the funds to light every lamp in the Home, and so it was a slow, dark descent from the attic. Rey held onto the handrail and half-expected every footfall to miss the step below it. The electrical era was upon them, according to the excitable newspaper headlines Rey scanned at breakfast, but the Church-donated building which housed Sister Maz’s orphans had not been outfitted for such a modern marvel.

Sister Maz showed Rey into a small, private room. A man stood by the window, his hands clasped in front of him. Even before he turned at the sound of their entrance, Rey noted how the cassock he wore hung from his shoulders loosely, swamping him even by the normal standards of the holy garb. His greying hair was badly in need of a trim, and even his beard seemed unruly. All this, and yet it was his eyes that struck Rey the most. He glared at the world as though he carried the weight of every sin ever confessed to him.

His harsh expression softened upon seeing Sister Maz.

“Thank you for hosting me.” His voice was a low growl, different from the usual measured tones of one who conducted sermons. “It’s good to see you again, Maz.”

Rey held her breath, waiting for Sister Maz to lambast the man for dropping her title. Instead, the old woman smiled.

“It’s always somewhere between a pleasure and a challenge to grant your favors, Father.”

Father Luke huffed at that. “Leia sends her best. Han, too, I imagine, although no one’s seen him in a few weeks.”

The priest didn’t sound concerned. Rey felt a flash of envy. To travel so frequently that no one batted an eyelid at your absence was a kind of freedom she had never known.

Then Rey registered the names Father Luke had spoken.

“Han Solo?” she asked, her eyes widening. “Leia Organa?”

Even she, orphaned nobody in the middle of nowhere, had heard of them. Before being chased out of Chicago, Leia Organa had been heavily involved in the speakeasy scene. Her husband, bootlegger extraordinaire Han Solo, was a prolific smuggler. Buried deep beneath the warnings of the Bible that Rey had internalised, she felt a jealous awe. Leia Organa would certainly not have to pick and choose which parts of her mansion to light.

“Yes,” the priest said, bemused. “Forgive me, you are …?”

_Nobody_, Rey almost said, before Sister Maz cleared her throat.

“Father, this is Rey. Rey, this is Father Luke.”

Rey nodded in greeting. “Hello, Father.”

Father Luke’s composure slipped for a moment. He gave Rey a quick appraisal, but Rey couldn’t tell if he was impressed by what he saw.

“Hello, Rey,” he said, recovering. “I didn’t expect to meet you so soon. Sister Maz has told me of your gift.”

Although Father Luke’s expression showed nothing more than intrigue, a warning whispered at the edges of Rey’s mind. If someone chose to take a dim view of her soothing ability, she could be labelled a witch. It was a ridiculous fear to have, she knew that. Superstition had no place in a world where entire rooms could be illuminated faster than thought. Electricity lit up the nights now, not witches’ pyres. Still, Rey erred on the side of caution.

“God charges me to comfort those he cannot,” she said slowly.

Father Luke’s lips thinned. “Indeed.”

Rey’s stomach turned. Could the priest see the doubt in her heart? Did he know of her gnawing worry that the Almighty was nothing more than a murmured prayer and some words on a page?

“I’ve come to seek your help,” Father Luke said. “My nephew is… disturbed.”

_He doesn’t know your heresy_, Rey told herself. Her heartbeat slowed to a steady thump. She had plenty of experience soothing the hysterical, and Father Luke’s nephew would likely be no different.

“I am reluctant to involve anyone outside of the family in Ben’s care,” Father Luke continued, not quite meeting Rey’s eyes, “but his condition has deteriorated recently. I fear that unless something is done, Korriban will no longer accept him as a patient.”

Rey paled. Korriban Asylum for the Chronic Insane was notorious for its inhabitants. It was said that the mad screamed and screamed until the orderlies joined their ranks. For a place like that to reject someone was a worrying sign.

“What—” Rey swallowed around a dry throat and tried again. “May I ask what’s wrong with him?”

“His mind is not always his own.” Father Luke’s reply was clipped, almost rehearsed.

Rey accepted the answer with a nod. She wouldn’t have understood the medical terms anyway.

“And you would like me to speak with him?” she clarified.

“I don’t expect miracles.”

It was an odd thing for a priest to say, in Rey’s opinion, particularly in such a scathing tone. Yet if she scrutinised Father Luke for long enough, she could make out fractures in his steely gaze. Sorrow crept out of the crevices of his face and told a story his words did not.

“I only want to exhaust every option I can,” he continued, quieter now.

There was such pain in his eyes as he spoke of his afflicted kin. Rey almost sighed. She yearned to be loved like that.

“I’ll do whatever I can to help him,” she promised.

* * *

“Stop tugging at your habit,” Father Luke muttered as they strode down the halls of Korriban two hours later.

The asylum was only a short car ride away from Sister Maz’s Home. Rey had tried to enjoy the rare trip out—in a car, no less—but she felt uncomfortable in her borrowed clothes. Even Father Luke’s brief tales of how his family had grown up in the area hadn’t been enough to distract her.

Rey dropped her hands but sent him an uneasy look.

“Dressing as a nun feels wrong, Father.”

The disguise had been decided as the best course of action to dissuade questions. Inmates in Korriban needed all the prayers they could get, after all. Rey’s presence in the all-male wing of the asylum would hopefully be overlooked if it meant saving a few souls.

“God’s eyes don’t settle on places like this, Rey,” Father Luke said. “He won’t know.”

Rey sent him a sidelong glance. He didn’t speak like any of the priests she had ever met. His belief seemed edged with bitterness.

A scream, shrill and echoing, cut through her contemplations. She shivered and reminded herself to be more understanding towards Father Luke. She supposed her faith would be tested too, if someone she loved ended up in a place like this.

Korriban was unexpectedly lovely to look at. Wealth had stamped its influence all over the wards. The corridors were bright and clean, far from the gothic doom Rey had been expecting. White tiles gleamed along the walls, and the wooden floor beneath them was polished to a shine. It could have been a regular hospital, if not for the faint, ever-present screeching.

Rey breathed through her nerves. Whatever wild-eyed, foaming madman she met would still be a human being deserving of her compassion and healing.

Father Luke slowed his stride as they rounded a corner onto another hallway. Rey panicked when a doctor, dressed in pristine white, exited one of the rooms ahead.

“Good afternoon, Father,” he said, nodding his head in greeting. His eyes betrayed a flicker of surprise when he saw Rey. “Sister.”

“Good afternoon,” Rey mumbled in return.

“Any trouble today, Doctor?” Father Luke asked.

The doctor’s lips downturned. “He had an episode earlier, Father. He’s still restrained.”

Father Luke nodded, unsurprised. Rey’s stomach knotted. She should have asked for more information before agreeing to help. Father Luke’s nephew must be too dangerous to be allowed even basic movement. Before she could voice her concerns, the doctor unlocked the door and pushed it open. Father Luke entered the room and gestured for Rey to follow.

The room was pleasant enough, if sparsely decorated. Its walls were a muted off-white. Two tall windows encompassed most of the far wall. They arched at the top and presented a lovely view of the well-kept grounds below. Again, Rey was struck by how much care went into the hospital. The families of the patients must have had an astonishing combination of money and guilt. A small cabinet, bolted to the floor, rested between the windows. There were no pictures, no artworks. Everything was impersonal and inoffensive.

The room’s main feature was a bed, set perpendicular to the windows. Railings bordered the mattress, caging in a tall man lying stretched out on the sheets. Ben, Father Luke had said. A simple name for such a physically impressive man. His wrists and ankles were shackled by thick metal cuffs. Waves of black hair spread over his pillow.

As Rey approached, she wanted to tilt her head to solve the interesting puzzle of Ben’s features. His eyes, almost as dark as his hair, seemed liquid in the sunlight. He watched Rey with the same intrigue she eyed him with, and it was all she could do to make sure her eyes didn’t linger on his plush lips. Her interactions with men were limited to visiting priests and the rare prospective fathers of some of the younger children. She had never seen a man who looked like Ben before.

Finally, Ben slid his gaze to Father Luke. His expression became even and he nodded once.

“Uncle.”

The two syllables were all it took for Rey to suppress a shiver. His voice was deep and melodious, like the hymns that rang through churches.

“Hello, Ben.” Father Luke’s mouth lifted awkwardly at one side, as though he had forgotten how to smile. “I’ve brought a visitor.”

“Yes.” Ben seemed shy as he brought his attention back to Rey. “Hello, Sister.”

Rey ignored the sudden urge to rip her habit from her head. She didn’t want there to be any lies between them, her and this complete stranger.

“My name is Rey,” she said.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Sister Rey.” Ben shifted his foot, causing his cuff to rattle. “I would stand, but…”

Rey’s lips twitched. Laughing seemed offensive in a place as bleak as Korriban, but his wry tone tickled her.

“I think I can forgive you,” she said.

A ghost of a smile tugged at Ben’s own mouth. Rey marvelled at him. He was far from what she had expected to find within Korriban’s walls. He was warm and wry, so out of place in the sterile asylum. Ben’s expression faltered under the weight of her admiration. He sighed at looked at Father Luke in something close to despair.

“Why would you bring her here, Uncle?” he asked in a low voice. “You know what will happen.”

Father Luke was unmoved, even as the ominous words caused a jolt of apprehension in Rey’s gut.

“Rey is skilled at soothing people,” Father Luke said.

Ben’s expression hardened.

“Is that what you think I need? To calm down?” His laugh was bitter. “Perhaps all I’ve been missing is a cup of chamomile tea. Quick, alert the orderlies and tell them you’ve found a cure.”

Father Luke bristled. “Sarcasm does not become us, Ben.”

Ben looked as though he disagreed. Rather than put words to his taut features, he turned his face away.

Uncomfortable, Rey trained her gaze on the world outside the windows. She had never had a family to compare dynamics, but not one of her childish fantasies of a loving home had involved such oddly barbed tension. Then again, she supposed that with one member in an asylum, any family relations were bound to be strained.

“Your mother sends her love,” Father Luke tried again after a few moments.

Ben made a small noise of contemplation. “She used to send books. Is this an upgrade or a downgrade?”

“Do you like to read?” Rey asked, quickly latching onto something that might steer the conversation into safer waters. “I could come back and read to you, if you like.”

A flicker of something soft moved through Ben’s eyes. It might have been gratitude, or even hope. Whatever it was faded into a sad smile as he shook his head.

“Make your promises after,” he said.

Rey frowned. “After what?”

“After you understand who it is you’d be reading—”

Ben’s breath caught in his throat. His smile froze and then fell. Rey expected him to cough and apologise, but instead he gasped for air. His veins bulged from his neck as he gritted his teeth. Rey hovered by his bedside, concerned.

“Ben?”

Instantly, Father Luke’s hand was on her arm.

“Rey, get back.”

Without taking her eyes from Ben, Rey shrugged off the priest’s grip. She clutched onto the railings of the bed, as though her proximity alone could help. Ben threw his head back, his eyes screwed tightly shut and his mouth open in a silent scream. Panic flooded her. Ben lay in agony before her, and she had no clue what to do. She whirled around to face Father Luke.

“Father, he needs help! He needs—”

Ben collapsed against the bed, boneless.

His heavy breaths filled the room, each one ragged with pain. Rey leaned over the bed, frantic. He hadn’t opened his eyes, but it seemed as though calmness was slowly stealing over him.

His eyes flashed open and instantly found Rey’s. Rey jumped back at the sudden movement. Different parts of his body tensed and relaxed. The movements were stiff, almost disjointed, like his body was a vehicle he wasn’t sure how to operate.

Rey stared down at him, horrified and entranced. The gentle, wry humour in Ben’s gaze had gone, replaced by something hard and malicious. His eyes raked over her form. She tried not to tremble, especially when his lips stretched into a grin.

“You’re no nun,” he accused lightly. “There’s an innocence about you, undoubtedly, but that wretched institution hasn’t sunk its claws into you yet.”

His eyes seared into her, beneath her borrowed clothes and into her flesh. Rey felt stripped to the bone. Ben nodded in apparent approval.

“Ben _will_ be pleased,” he noted, settling back into the mattress. “He takes a far dimmer view to corrupting the holy than I do.”

Unnerved, Rey took a single step back. Why was he speaking about himself in the third person? Why did the air around him feel _different_, somehow? When she breathed in, her lungs filled with a coldness she couldn’t level with the sunlight shining in through the windows.

Ben yanked his wrist and gave a loud sigh at the cuff’s restriction.

“Is this because of my last outing? It’s hardly my fault that Doctor Francis has such lewd thoughts about other men. If he didn’t want them announced, he shouldn’t have been thinking them.” Ben groaned. “No one has a sense of humor anymore. This is such a _severe_ land. Wring out any square foot of earth and you’ll get a hundred barrels of blood. You’re bathing in it with every step. Then you take everything designed for pleasure and call it a sin. Is it any wonder men go mad?”

Rey cleared her throat. “Is that what happened to you, Ben?”

Her attempts to project a sense of calm couldn’t find a grip on Ben’s dark aura, likely due to the unease coiling low in her stomach. Her fear heightened at the small smile Ben levelled her. He looked like he dealt in the kinds of secrets that rotted the soul.

“I’m not quite Ben, little one,” he said, admonishing. “Not by a long stretch, in fact.”

_You’re in an asylum_, Rey reminded herself. _Play along_.

“Then who am I speaking to?”

With a sharp movement she couldn’t track, Ben’s lips twisted into a snarl of pure contempt. Rey felt breathless, even though the black look was directed at Father Luke. Rey glanced behind her shoulder at the ashen-faced priest.

“Have you told her nothing?” Ben’s eyes narrowed at Father Luke’s silence. “I see you still collect foolish little playthings. Do you really think your god will forgive you, after all you’ve done?”

“God is gracious,” Father Luke replied, his voice raw. “He will reward me for the suffering I have endured.”

Ben barked out a laugh. “And what of the suffering you’ve inflicted?”

Another clang of metal against metal punctuated his words as he jerked his wrist. Rey winced.

“Ben—”

Ben’s eyes shot to her. Fury burned in his gaze as his lip curled again. Strands of Rey’s hair yanked from her head as her veil was torn away by invisible hands. She cried out in fright, but the ordeal only lasted a moment. Her veil lay strewn and ripped on the ground.

“I am not Ben.”

Rey shivered that anyone could sound so calm with such fire in his eyes. She nodded slowly and waited for her breaths to even out. She had met enough volatile creatures in her life to know when to tread carefully.

“What may I call you?” she asked.

“You want my name, little one?” the man asked, mirth softening his features. “Are we to be friends, then?”

“I’d like to help you,” Rey said carefully.

“Like a lamb bearing its neck to the lion,” he cooed. “Chained or not, I’ll eat you whole.”

He watched Rey’s slow retreat with predatory glee, and then nodded at Father Luke in mock-gratitude.

“Truly, you have done a kindness in delivering the girl.” His gaze slid back to Rey with silken ease. “The things Ben thought when he first saw you! A good Catholic boy would be on his knees praying for forgiveness. Of course, he wasn’t the one on his knees in that filthy mind of his. It was quite the scene. You were obedient before him, looking up at him with those big eyes, your pretty lips stretched wide around—”

Rey lunged forwards and clapped a hand over the man’s mouth before she knew what she was doing.

“_Stop_,” she hissed.

He stilled beneath her. His groan vibrated against her palm. Rey only pressed down harder. Her fear and outrage swirled inside her mind, desperate for an outlet. She pushed it down, through her body and into his. Only when she felt him go limp did she move away.

Once the danger had passed, panic stirred in Rey again. She had practically attacked a vulnerable man chained to a bed. Worse, she felt justified.

Ben’s eyelids fluttered. He rolled his head and finally opened his bleary eyes. When his gaze focused, he stared at Rey with his eyes wide with wonder.

“Ben?” Father Luke asked warily.

Ben didn’t take his eyes from Rey.

“You banished him,” he whispered.

Father Luke was by Rey’s side faster than she heard him move.

“Forever?” he asked, his tone sharp.

Ben shook his head. “No, I can still feel him. But— no one has ever been able to suppress him like that.” He seemed overcome. “What did you do?”

Rey shrugged helplessly. The reality of the situation was closing in over her head, and she felt a terrible urge to run far from Korriban and never look back.

“I just wanted him to stop talking,” she mumbled.

A blush spread across Ben’s cheeks as though he’d been slapped.

“I’m sorry. For whatever he said, I’m sorry.” His voice was desperate as Rey looked away. “I don’t have any control over him.”

Rey bit her lip. Her borrowed veil was ruined on the floor from when whatever was inside of Ben had displayed its casual menace. She glanced back at him, wanting to reassure him that she didn’t blame him, but the words wouldn’t come. The beseeching shine to his eyes faded into sad resignation as Rey took measured steps away from him.

She turned to Father Luke and tried to tamp down on the anger that rose at the sight of his unrepentant expression.

“I think, Father Luke, that you owe me an explanation.”

The priest sighed. “Yes, I imagine that I do.”

Rey’s temper sparked at his inconvenienced tone. He had knowingly put her in danger, and yet he was the one affected? Whatever good will she had felt towards the priest evaporated.

Her animosity faded as she looked back to the man in the bed.

“Ben—”

She faltered. She didn’t want to abandon him to his misery, but whatever lived inside of him would drag her down too if she wasn’t careful.

“It’s alright. I understand.” Ben’s smile wavered at the edges, doused by the sorrow in his gaze. “Goodbye, Rey. It was a pleasure to meet you.”

Rey couldn’t force her legs to move. Leaving felt wrong, as though a band had been looped through the railings on Ben’s bed and then tied around her chest. She was never one to refuse someone in need. Only when Father Luke muttered a gruff goodbye to Ben did she take her first few steps away.

Just as the door closed, she thought she heard a muffled gasp, as though someone had pressed their face into the side of a pillow to try and stem tears.


	2. caress me with pain

Once they returned to Sister Maz’s Home, Rey gathered all of her boldness and demanded privacy. Sister Maz obliged without question. Rey stared at her, trying to divine whether she had known what she was sending Rey into, but the nun’s weathered face betrayed nothing. Even if she had known, Rey wasn’t sure it would have made a difference. For a nun, Sister Maz was astonishingly immune to guilt.

Now, Rey sat across from Father Luke in the Home’s small chapel and waited for him to make sense of whatever had happened in Korriban.

“My father was a man of the cloth,” Father Luke began. His eyes fixed on a point to the left of Rey, and his eyes became hazier as he lost himself in the past. “He was devoted to God, and to serving Him. He had never had cause to doubt our Lord. And then, he fell in love.” Father Luke’s lips twisted in an unhappy excuse for a smile. “If he even tried to fight his feelings, I have no evidence of it.”

Rey bit back her impatience. The only family member of Father Luke’s she was interested in hearing about lay in an asylum bed, sharing his body with something sinister. Still, she had to assume this was relevant.

“My mother was from a very good family. They had wealth, power, influence, and a determination to see their daughter married to someone of equal stature. A lowly priest from the middle of nowhere didn’t fit into their plans. So my parents married in secret, in defiance of everything they knew. My mother soon became pregnant. And not long after that, there came a diagnosis.” Father Luke raised his eyes to the crucifix on the wall. “The doctor said that even if my mother survived carrying her children to term, the trauma of birth would…”

He trailed off and shook his head. Guilt flickered across his face, so quickly called to the surface that Rey wondered if it always lay in wait.

“My father became a man possessed. Every breath which was not spent reassuring my mother that he would find a cure was passed in desperate prayer. His love was a fearsome, obsessive thing. It had no place in God’s light. So, when God did not listen, my father turned to the Devil.”

It had to be Rey’s imagination that the temperature around her dropped. The fine hair on her arms pricked up and she fought not to shudder.

“The rituals he enacted, the prices he paid… He detailed them all in his journals. The pages he had once filled with God’s love became testaments to how far he had fallen. I have tried to banish the details from my mind, but evil’s brand does not fade.” Father Luke closed his eyes for a moment. “Towards the end of her pregnancy, my mother pleaded with my father to return to God’s light. The journals were disjointed by this point, but from what I could understand, my father believed that he was being tested by the Devil. He had to prove his loyalty, and only then would my mother’s life be spared. Despite my father’s warnings, my mother did not stop begging. She said, _God is merciful_. Over and over, _God is merciful_.”

Father Luke stared at the crucifix as though it was his last remaining anchor to the world. When he spoke, his words were almost controlled enough that Rey didn’t hear the shake in his tone.

“My father lashed out. My mother was taken to the hospital. She died not long after.”

There was a lifetime of horror in those short, factual sentences. Rey wrapped her arms around her middle in an attempt to comfort herself.

“My father was a broken man. In his madness and grief, he was susceptible to the darkness he had opened himself to. A demon appeared to him, night after night, taunting him with visions of my mother burning in hell. She had lost the will to live, the demon said, which was tantamount to suicide. The demon could save my mother from eternal damnation, but he demanded a price. When the demon asked for the soul of my father’s first grandchild, my father did not hesitate to agree. He was childless and intended to remain celibate for the rest of his life, without a child and much less a grandchild to consider.”

Father Luke shook his head.

“The demon knew what my father did not. My mother had given birth shortly before passing away. She insisted on separating my sister and I so that my father might never find us. Leia and I were nineteen before we first met.” His smile fell as his expression clouded. “I met my father before he passed. He had made a life for himself outside of the Church, and he left everything to me. We found his journals years after his death, when Ben was already three.”

Amid the dreadfulness of the tale at large, Rey felt a desperate wave of sorrow for Ben, whose fate had been decided long before he was born.

Father Luke’s head drooped. Retelling his family’s tragedy drained him, Rey could tell, and yet it wasn’t at an end yet.

“I alerted Leia to what our father had written. I think we would have dismissed his talk of demons as the ravings of a madman, but Ben…” Father Luke blew out a helpless breath. “Ben was a peculiar child. He knew things that no child had any place knowing. Things only uttered in Confession. As he grew older, his temper would spike. He became someone else in those moments. Someone—something—malicious. His nannies never lasted long, and soon enough the neighbourhood children refused to play with him. He had to be withdrawn from school.”

He drew in a rattling breath. When he spoke, his voice cracked at the edges.

“There was such hatred within him. Such _rage_. He never remembered his outbursts afterwards, which was only crueller. Everyone was terrified of him, and he had no idea why. He was always such a sensitive boy.” Father Luke cleared his throat. “Eventually, one of Ben’s tutors died. His neck was— the _angle_. The unnatural strength needed to …”

Rey held herself tighter. Father Luke was involved with a terror so encompassing it couldn’t be put into words. More than that, he had dragged her into it, too.

“We decided to perform an exorcism. Ben was nine years old.”

“An _exorcism_?” Rey repeated, aghast. “Father—”

“We thought it was the only way.”

From the misery in his tone, Rey knew that he had had this argument with himself, perhaps with others, ever since the idea was first brought up.

“What was supposed to banish the demon only brought him forth. He had never spoken through Ben before, only acted, but it was as though Ben was his puppet.”

Father Luke closed his eyes and bowed his head. Rey accepted that she might never know what that first conversation had entailed.

“The demon within Ben is named Kylo Ren,” Father Luke said, his voice carefully level. “Whatever deal he struck with my father was never completed. Perhaps because my mother was never truly in Hell, or perhaps God granted us slight mercy after all. Whatever the reason, Kylo Ren could only entwine himself with Ben’s soul, not take it completely. He promised us that he would grow stronger, and once he did there would be no light left in Ben.”

_I have to help him._

The thought was like a lightning strike into Rey’s reason: unpredictable and irrevocable.

“For ten years, Ben did an admirable job in suppressing him. There were incidents, of course, but Ben was devout. Even when Kylo began manifesting for longer periods of time, Ben never lost his faith. When he decided to become a priest, we were delighted.” Father Luke’s words picked up pace as his anguish rose. “His first night in seminary woke Kylo’s wrath. The demon emerged surrounded by icons of the god he loathed. He burned everything to the ground, including twelve of my— twelve of my students.”

As she watched Father Luke swallow his pain, Rey was struck mute. How could one family endure such tragedy?

“Ben committed himself to Korriban the next day.” Father Luke wouldn’t look at her. “He’s been there for four years this winter.”

With those words, Father Luke’s personality slotted into place for Rey. His stoicism, which so often bordered on outright hostility, was hiding how his soul was slowly being eaten away by guilt. She pitied him with an intensity that almost made her cry.

“You did everything you could,” she said, leaning towards him.

“It wasn’t enough,” he insisted, tears forming a sheen over his eyes. “I failed him.”

“You didn’t fail him. You came to me.” She considered using her ability to soothe Father Luke, but she needed him to hear her unaltered. “I’ll help him.”

“I don’t want to put you in danger.” Father Luke’s eyebrows drew together. “I was foolish to think Kylo Ren would not manifest in your presence.”

“He has terrorised your family long enough.” As Rey spoke, her vague plans formed into a promise. “I’m going to give Ben his life back.”

The memory of Ben’s sorrow as he watched her back away haunted her. Worse than his hurt was his lack of surprise. He had expected to be left behind, as so many others must have fled from him. That stuck like a thorn into Rey’s heart. Ben was just as lonely as she was, and perhaps even more hopeless.

Purpose swelled within her. She had been given her power for a reason. She had been training for years with fussy children and grieving elders, and now it was time for something greater.

Father Luke gave one small nod, and Rey’s mission was sealed.

* * *

Rey wanted to return to Korriban immediately, but Father Luke cautioned her to rest and regain her strength. That night, she listened to the shuffling and soft snores of the girls around her. She wondered where Ben would go once he was free from the demon and released from the asylum. He had a family to go back to, but perhaps he might not want to do that straight away. Perhaps he might want to travel first. Perhaps he might take her with him.

Despite a broken sleep, Rey felt renewed the next morning. She barely heard the chatter at breakfast, too consumed with the day ahead. If all went well, she would be saving a soul today. It was optimistic, given that she didn’t actually have a method of banishing Kylo Ren permanently, but living in an orphanage had a way of granting resilience against reality.

Rey faltered as she fixed her habit in place. She had been focusing on saving Ben, and not on the wider implications of his possession. If demons were real, did that mean God was real, too? Kylo had sneered at Father Luke’s faith, but he had used the words _your god_. Were there different deities out there? And what of Kylo himself? He had ripped the veil from her head while chained down in a body that wasn’t his. What could he do if angered and at full strength?

Some of Rey’s eager determination faded. She was walking into something she didn’t understand, which had a very real chance of hurting her.

_Just like it’s hurting Ben_, a soft voice in her mind reminded her.

The journey to Korriban was filled with the same push and pull of doubt and resolution.

At Rey’s insistence, Father Luke didn’t join her in Ben’s room.

“I’ll be here,” the priest said, with an unhappy glance at the door. “Just outside. If you need anything…”

“Scream?” Rey asked, as though the sound of distress would be out of place in a madhouse.

“You don’t have to do this, Rey.”

She opened her mouth to argue. After all, who better to understand divine obligation than a priest? But Father Luke’s faith had been slipping away from him bit by bit, and now she wasn’t sure if he held obligations to anyone but his family now.

So she gave him a small nod and entered Ben’s room. Ben didn’t look up at her entrance. It was only as she moved closer to his bed and murmured a greeting that he shifted his head towards her. He tried to move, but the clanging of his cuffs echoed through the space.

Rey grimaced in pity. Ben hardly seemed to notice. He watched her with the same awe he had shown when she had banished Kylo.

“You came back,” he said, his hushed tones more suited to a church than an asylum.

Rey nodded in earnest. “I want to help you.”

Every thought that flickered through Ben’s mind projected onto his features. Disbelief-joy-excitement-fear settled into wariness. Rey watched the progress with fascination. A man who felt everything so strongly should not be sentenced to wither away chained to a bed in a madhouse.

“Did my uncle tell you what happened?” he asked after a moment.

“Yes.”

“Did he tell you why?” he pressed.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Rey said, taking another step closer. “None of this is your fault.”

The sound that escaped from Ben’s mouth might have been a laugh, if not for its hopelessness.

“I heard that a lot growing up,” he muttered. “Less so after my tutor died. Not once since the seminary burned down.”

Rey felt a flash of anger towards Ben’s family. She couldn’t imagine the pain they had gone through, watching their beloved son and nephew fall deeper into a darkness he couldn’t control, but she also couldn’t imagine ever letting him believe that he was to blame. She planted her hands on the railings of his bed and glared down at him.

“This is not your fault. There’s light inside of you, I know it.”

“How?” Ben asked, scrutinising her. “We’ve barely met.”

If Rey focused on the thin thread of hope in his voice, her heart might break. Instead, she tried to describe her certainty.

“When Kylo emerged, there was a strong sense of coldness and decay,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “Everything felt _wrong_, somehow. You don’t feel like that.”

Ben’s gaze searched hers, as though he was debating whether to believe her. Rey held the look with as much determination as she could. Finally, he looked away.

“He’s getting stronger,” he said quietly, staring at the ceiling. “I can feel him in my head, like a poison. I have the most dreadful thoughts. I can’t always tell who they belong to. I hope they’re his, but…” His throat bobbed as he swallowed. His dark eyes found hers again. “Have you ever been corrupted, Rey?”

There was such an undertone to the question that for a moment, Rey feared that Kylo had emerged. She shook her head. Ben hummed.

“Your devotion to God must be a fearsome thing.”

It was on the tip of Rey’s tongue to ask what he meant, before she remembered the clothes she wore.

“I— no, this isn’t mine.” She plucked at her habit. “I borrowed it.”

Ben raised his eyebrows. “So you’re not a nun?”

Rey told herself she was imagining the relief in his voice. She shook her head with a sheepish smile.

“Father Luke thought it would be simpler to gain access if I dressed the part. He was right, although Kylo didn’t approve.”

Ben’s eyes widened. “Did he hurt you?”

“No, no,” Rey reassured him. “Just frightened me.”

Ben gritted his teeth and shook his head. He sat up as much as his manacles would allow and captured Rey in his gaze.

“I would never hurt you,” he said, his voice low and insistent. “And as much as it’s in my power, I would never let him hurt you, either.”

Rey nodded. She believed him. She probably deserved to wind up in an asylum herself, but she believed him. Something bloomed in her chest with the promise of hope. The warmth of it reminded her why she was here.

“I want to try something,” she said. “With your permission. It might be a way to get Kylo out.”

Ben tugged on his chains. He groaned at the effort, putting all of his strength into trying to break free. Satisfied when he couldn’t, he turned back to Rey.

“Promise me that if you think you’re in any danger, you’ll leave.” His features grew sterner at her silence. “Rey. Promise me.”

A domestic scene passed before Rey’s eyes. Ben, wrapping his arms around her waist and nuzzling into her neck as she did the dishes. Ben, lightly scolding her for not finishing her meal. Ben, reading to a small, dark-haired child as Rey watched from the doorway, swaddling an infant.

Ben, Ben, Ben.

She had already woven him into her future, and it was up to her to make sure that future came to pass.

“Let me help you,” Rey whispered, and placed a palm over his forehead.

A great force pulled her forwards. She felt as though she was falling, although some distant part of her mind registered that she hadn’t moved from Ben’s bedside.

When she opened her eyes, she was in another white room. There were no windows, no furniture. Nothing but a hulking figure dressed in black, staring at her from the far corner. He shared Ben’s features, and from the looks of it his height and build, but there was a snarling, threatening energy surrounding him.

Rey’s mouth went dry.

Kylo Ren.


	3. strip me of shame

The demon stared at her for one long moment before his mouth split open into a smile. There was no joy to be found in it.

“Little witch.”

The greeting was quiet with admiration. Rey shivered. She wanted nothing from the creature except for his swift exit.

“I’m no witch,” she said, proud of how her voice hardly wavered. “My gift is from God.”

“Really?” Kylo sounded politely interested. “Which one?”

Panic wound its way around Rey’s chest and began to tighten. She had only meant to find Kylo’s energy signature, not the demon himself. How was she supposed to banish him now? She’d have to touch him, presumably, but there was no universe in which that ended well for her. Could she even touch him in whatever state they were in?

“I can hear you thinking,” Kylo taunted. “You want to know if you can touch me? Come here and let’s find out.”

Rey recoiled. “How did you—?”

“You’re in Ben’s mind. I am Ben. Or at least, a part of him. You have no secrets here.”

The timbre of his voice was familiar, and yet lacking all the warm quirks of Ben’s voice. Kylo must have no form of his own if he had to latch onto Ben’s appearance.

“And how do you know _Ben_ doesn’t look like _me_?” Kylo challenged, cocking his head to the side. “Which of us came first, after all?”

Rey noticed that despite Kylo’s sneer, he still hadn’t moved any closer. She regretted the throwaway realisation a moment later, when Kylo pushed himself away from the wall. He stalked closer with sinuous movements, his eyes fixed on Rey’s. Rey stood frozen. She didn’t want to be backed into a wall. There were no windows in the room, much less a door. It wasn’t even really a room. How was she supposed to escape from a concept?

“I won’t hurt you,” Kylo said, coming to a stop a few feet away from her. He seemed amused, content to treat her as something between a curiosity and a distraction.

Rey craned her neck to continue meeting his stare, determined not to look away. Ancient instincts inside her screamed to back down, to avert her gaze in supplication. She ignored them.

“Such mistrust,” he mused. “You have no idea what gifts I could bestow.”

“I know everything I need to know about you,” Rey spat.

“You do?” He peered into her stony gaze. His voice dropped. “Ah, you do.”

Something stirred low within Rey’s stomach. She had never heard Ben sound quite like _that_ before. Kylo’s voice was crafted from intimacy, the way one would speak to a spouse or a beloved enemy. She glared at him. He hadn’t earned the right to speak to her in such a softly coaxing tone.

Kylo only seemed drawn in by her anger. He took a step closer, and then another one. One more and he was in her personal space. Rey’s breaths became unsteady. He tilted his head at her, not angry but displeased.

“A single tale from an unreliable storyteller and you think you know me? You, whose heritage is a blank page. You could well be a witch. You could be my kin, snatched from hell and abandoned in the mortal world.”

What did he know of her heritage?

_Unsafe,_ Rey’s instincts cried, louder now. _Unsafe, unsafe, unsafe._

“I’m not evil,” she said through a dry mouth.

Kylo dragged his eyes down to her mouth and leaned in, breathing his next words over her lips.

“Wouldn’t you like to be?”

Rey stepped back, flustered. Her heart hammered in her chest. Desire, horrific and unwanted, sparked within her. Whether it was Kylo’s doing or her own confused reaction to the thing that wore Ben’s face, she didn’t know.

The distance helped, if only slightly. Rey held herself still again to stop from trembling.

“I’m here to free Ben Solo,” she said in a clear voice.

Kylo’s demeanor shifted as he realized he had failed to tempt her. He looked bored.

“Better minds than yours have tried,” he said.

Rey raised an eyebrow. “Have any of them ever spoken to you directly like this?”

“No.” A muscle ticked in his jaw as he admitted, “I didn’t know it could be done.”

Rey filed that away. If there were things Kylo didn’t know about his imprisonment, she could use that to her advantage.

“A daring ploy, I might add,” Kylo said. “You opened yourself to evil for a pair of pretty eyes. Are your marriage prospects really so dreadful?” He clicked his tongue in mock-pity. “They must be. Poor little orphan, left on a doorstep. Only allowed to stay because her ability makes her useful.”

Rey went cold.

“That isn’t—how do you know that?”

“I know a great many things, little one.” Kylo smiled, relishing his next words. “I know who your parents are.”

Rey’s world narrowed to the gleam of victory in Kylo’s eyes. She took a breath to demand answers but before she could say the first word, the trance broke.

Ben’s room slowly bled back into focus as she opened her eyes. Her chest heaved as though she had been running for miles.

“Let me back,” she muttered, the words slurring together. She pressed down on Ben’s forehead. “Let me go back.”

Ben angled his head away. His skin was slick with sweat and his brow creased with worry.

“Rey, what happened?”

“I’m fine, I just—” The world shifted sideways. She stumbled and grasped the railings of Ben’s bed for support. “I just need to…”

“That’s enough for today,” Ben said firmly.

Rey wanted to argue, but the grey tinge to Ben’s skin silenced her. Whatever she had done in speaking with Kylo had taken a toll on both of them.

“Did I hurt you?” she asked, concerned.

Ben shook his head. “I feel tired, that’s all. Was Kylo pleased with his eviction notice?”

“I didn’t actually get that far.”

Rey loosened her grip on the railings and slid down the bed. The frame dug into her spine and the tiled floor was hard beneath her, but at least her legs had stopped trembling.

“He knew things about me,” she whispered.

There was a sharp intake of breath from above.

“You can’t trust him,” Ben said, his tone hard.

Rey closed her eyes. “I know.”

It might have been hours before Ben spoke again.

“I think my uncle should accompany you in here next time.”

Rey tried not to let her disappointment show. She had built a future around Ben, and he didn’t even want to be alone in the same room as her.

“It isn’t proper,” Ben continued. Rey wondered if his justification sounded as weak to his ears as it did to hers. “I don’t want people to start gossiping about you.”

“They already gossip,” Rey said with a snort. “But if you would feel more comfortable…”

“This isn’t for my comfort. What if Kylo comes out while you’re alone with me?”

Rey gathered her strength and stood up. She wanted to see Ben’s expression when he spoke in such a vulnerable tone.

“I can suppress him,” she promised.

“What if he attacks before you get the chance to?” Ben shook his head. He looked miserable. “If something happened to you because of me…”

“I know the dangers,” Rey soothed. She lifted a shoulder in an awkward shrug. “And maybe I think it’s worth it. Getting to know you.”

Ben regarded her with the same suspicion as when she had first entered the room. Rey didn’t let her expression flicker. Ben reminded her of the nervous stray dog that she sometimes saw near Sister Maz’s Home. The beast, unused to kindness, snarled at her every attempt to get close. It had only ever accepted food from her once, when it was starving. Better poisoned food, it must have thought, than no food at all.

Eventually, Ben’s expression lost its edge. Whether he had found what he was looking for or not, Rey couldn’t say.

“That’s what I’m worried about,” he murmured. “If Kylo knows that I am fond of you, he’ll use it as a target.”

Rey blushed as she remembered the vivid description Kylo had painted for her during their first meeting. It didn’t seem possible that Ben—that anyone—could have those thoughts about her. A new world was opening before her, and she was equally terrified and enticed.

“I think he already knows,” she said.

Ben held her gaze for long enough that the tips of his ears turned red under her attention.

* * *

Father Luke asked after Rey’s efforts the moment the car door closed.

“I made contact with Kylo Ren,” Rey told him. “In the flesh, so to speak.”

Father Luke’s hands tightened on the wheel.

“Were you successful in banishing him?”

“No. The—trance, or whatever it was, broke.” Rey stifled a yawn and watched the passing scenery. “It was as though I read Ben’s mind, but I was in there, too. It didn’t take much effort to manifest, but it took a lot to maintain. I didn’t realize it until I was back in Ben’s room. I’ll prepare differently next time.”

“Did you speak to him much?”

“I didn’t learn anything of use. I got the feeling that he wasn’t sure how our connection worked, either. He was careful not to touch me.” Rey tried not to think of those plush lips, so close to hers, lifting up in a smirk as he tempted her with sin. “He could read my thoughts. And he…”

Rey bit her lip, wondering how to explain what had happened. She knew better than to blindly believe anything a demon had told her, just as she knew that Father Luke would ridicule her for it, but she had a small, nagging feeling that Kylo might be telling the truth.

“Go on,” Father Luke prompted.

“He told me things about my past.”

“Reasonable, given he could read your mind.”

Rey twisted in her seat to face him, determined to make him understand.

“No, Father, _I_ don’t know about my past. It was like he delved into my memories, the ones I didn’t even realise I had.”

Father Luke kept his eyes on the road, but Rey could sense a growing agitation about him.

“He may give you kernels of truth, but he’s a liar by nature,” he said, his voice just above a growl. “You can’t trust a single thing he says.”

Rey closed her eyes. He didn’t understand.

“He told me he knew who my parents are,” she whispered.

The car came to an abrupt stop. Rey’s eyes flew open in alarm. They had pulled into an alleyway with nothing more than trash cans and a startled cat to keep them company. When she turned to Father Luke to demand an answer, he was already staring at her. Far from the anger she had been expecting from him, he looked desperate.

“Rey,” he said, making her name into a plea. “Kylo Ren is a demon. He will make blasphemy sound like a hymn. I’ve known grown men weep to hear another verse. Please, do not listen to him.”

Rey nodded in slow acquiescence. Still, even as Father Luke breathed out a sigh of relief and continued driving back to the Home, a mutinous thought built in her mind. Father Luke _and_ his father had both gone to extreme lengths to protect their family. Why should she have to show cautious judgement when the secret to unlocking her past lay just out of reach? She wasn’t a fool, or a child.

She just wanted a family. One way or another, she would find one in Ben or Kylo Ren.


	4. feed me your hate

Rey felt like she couldn’t concentrate unless she was in Korriban, either talking with Ben or delving into his mind to find the demon within. She resented having to do menial tasks around the Home when the time could be spent on learning the secrets Kylo insisted he knew.

“Is everything alright, Rey?”

Rey jumped, knocking the bucket of soapy water across the floor. She hissed out an annoyed breath and set the bucket upright, but it was too late. Her skirt was soaked, and the bathroom floor was one large puddle.

“Sorry, Sister, I didn’t hear you come in.”

Rey sopped up the water as best she could with a towel, feeling Sister Maz’s shrewd gaze on her.

“You seem distracted of late,” the nun commented.

Rey leant back on her heels. She couldn’t tell Sister Maz the full extent of what was happening during her visits to the asylum, but some of her no-nonsense advice would be welcome.

“Korriban is more than its walls,” Rey confessed. “The things I learn in there stay with me.”

“The things you learn from Ben, or from that beast inside of him?” Sister Maz chuckled dryly at the look on Rey’s face. “Don’t look so shocked, child. I’ve known that boy since birth.”

Her smile faded. She crouched down beside Rey with a spryness that belied her many years.

“I won’t waste my breath telling you to be on your guard,” she said. “I would never have reached out to Father Luke if I didn’t think you were capable of handling the demon. Although I do wonder, is it easier to resist temptation when you already know what would entice you the most?”

Rey frowned. “What do you mean?”

“He must have offered you information on your parents, no?” Sister Maz clucked. “Or perhaps he’s shown you a vision of the future where you’re surrounded by fat, happy children.”

Unlike Father Luke’s caustic tone when warning her against Kylo’s manipulations, Sister Maz’s words were warm with empathy. Rey swallowed around the lump in her throat. She was tired of being made to feel bad for wanting things.

Sister Maz took Rey’s hands in her own.

“We are human, Rey,” she said. “We are tempted. We make mistakes. As long as we repent them, God is merciful. He understands.”

Rey lowered her head to hide the doubt she feared would shine through her eyes. Sister Maz squeezed her hands.

“It’s quite the situation, isn’t it? I’ve spent many an hour in prayer that our Lord will give that poor family some respite.”

Rey smiled. Despite her own misgivings about religion, she had always admired how Sister Maz took to her role like a devoted, exasperated wife. If there was a Heaven, one day she would be its second-in-command, shaking her head at God’s will and barking orders to the angels.

“You said you’ve known Ben since he was a child,” Rey ventured after a few moments. “What was he like?”

Sister Maz cocked her head in thought.

“Far too bright for his own good,” she settled on. “He liked to read. Devoured history books, in particular. He had the most beautiful penmanship I’ve ever seen.”

Rey thought back on Ben’s hands. They seemed more likely to crush a pen than to create something pretty. Her amusement turned wistful. There were still so many things she didn’t know about him. She hoped that the world would be kind, for once, and let her discover them.

* * *

Rey wasted no time during her next visit to Korriban. With a resolute pressure, she placed her hand against Ben’s forehead. Again, she had the sensation of being yanked forwards.

Again, Kylo Ren was waiting for her in the white-walled room.

“You came back.”

Rey didn’t read too much into his speculative tone. Of course he was interested in her. She was the only person he had ever met who could communicate with him in this way.

“I told you,” she said, lingering near one of the walls. “I’m here to save Ben.”

“Hm. Interesting how you haven’t actually attempted that yet.”

Rey scowled.

“If it was easy, it would have been done years ago.”

“The first exorcism didn’t really take,” Kylo acknowledged with a nod. “The ones after that were barely irritants.”

Rey tried not to feel daunted. If a demon’s natural enemy was those who worshipped a higher power, then Father Luke should have banished him on the first attempt.

Kylo took slow, measured steps towards her. His eyes didn’t leave hers, even as they narrowed in thought.

“I know the uncertainty in your heart,” he said. “You see through the lies of the holy men.”

Rey shook her head, but Kylo smiled. His gaze swept her face, taking her in as though she was something precious.

“All those doubts,” he murmured. “I’ll make you a believer.”

As she had the first time they met, Rey retreated. She felt locked into a dance with him, never in the lead.

“Go on, then, how will you get rid of me?” Kylo asked, watching her back away in amusement. “Bearing in mind the madhouse they have him locked up in has already tried their hardest to root me out. Demons and madness are the same thing to healers.”

The inmates’ screams rang through Rey’s memory. How many of them had been because of the treatments they were being subjected to?”

“I feel everything they do to Ben,” Kylo said, picking up on Rey’s thoughts, “even if it’s only echoes. He didn’t enjoy the ice bath much. They keep threatening to cut parts of his brain away, but I’ve stepped in more than once to ensure that doesn’t happen. Barbarians.”

His nose wrinkled in light disgust, as though he had watched a pig being slaughtered before his eyes. The dismissive motion made Rey’s fury boil over.

“How dare you stand there and mock!” she said, forcing her hands down to her sides so that she didn’t jab a finger into his chest. “You ruined his life!”

Kylo’s features sharpened.

“I _saved_ his life,” he hissed.

He towered over her, his anger beating down. Rey felt the weight of it as though he was physically lashing out. The feeling made her own rage falter. He felt sincere.

“What do you mean?” she asked, quieter.

Kylo held himself still as he contemplated her.

“Did your priest tell you what happened at the seminary?”

“Yes.”

His lip curled. “No. By the time Ben moved in, the old man had been on edge for days. Ben had noticed, but he just assumed Luke was nervous about introducing him to his other little initiates. Luke took great pride in the cult he had built around himself.”

Dread descended on Rey, as though she was watching a catastrophe unfold in slow motion, narrating by the hypnotic lull of Kylo’s voice.

“While Ben slept on his first night, I felt something was wrong. I emerged just in time to see Luke standing over the bed with a blade in his raised hand.” Kylo lifted a shoulder in an unremorseful shrug. “I did what was necessary to protect myself.”

Rey shook her head. No, that couldn’t be. The tears in her eyes caught in her throat.

“Liar,” she whispered.

“He couldn’t risk letting me destroy everything he had worked so hard for,” Kylo said, disgust thick in his tone. “Ben was to be a sacrifice to his greatness.”

“No.”

“Luke Skywalker thinks he is a god.”

“_No._”

Rey couldn’t articulate why it was so important to her that Kylo was lying. She couldn’t stand the thought that all of Father Luke’s aching concern for his nephew was only a façade to cover his own misdeeds.

“Ask him yourself,” Kylo said, his gaze still searching hers.

Rey looked down, conflicted. She remembered every instance of Father Luke’s panic at hearing that she had spoken directly to Kylo, and his insistence that she not believe a thing the demon said. He had just been trying to protect her, hadn’t he?

“If you don’t believe me,” Kylo said, a muscle twitching beneath his eye, “then ask. Him. Yourself.”

Why couldn’t she sense any deception coming from Kylo? Desperation rose within her. He couldn’t be telling the truth. Rey stepped back and jerked awake from the trance.

Back in the asylum, Ben peered up at her. His neutral expression quickly shifted into worry as he saw the tears dampening Rey’s cheeks.

“Did you hurt you?” he asked, his eyes scanning every inch of her he could see.

Rey shook her head. She didn’t trust herself to speak.

“I need to speak with Father Luke,” she said.

The moment she felt like she could walk without stumbling, she stormed out of Ben’s room. Father Luke sprang into action. He followed in her wake, calling after her in confusion. Rey waited until they were a few corridors away before rounding on the priest.

“Is it true?” she demanded. “Did you try to murder him?”

The color drained from Father Luke’s cheeks. It shouted his guilt louder than if he had screamed.

“Rey,” he said weakly. “I told you, you can’t trust anything the demon says…”

“I can’t believe this,” Rey muttered, running her fingers through her hair. “I can’t believe you would do that to him. Your _sister’s son_!”

Father Luke opened and closed his mouth, searching for an explanation that didn’t seem to come. His shoulders slumped and he looked close to tears.

“There is so much darkness in him.” He sounded defeated. “It’s rising every day, and I don’t know if he’s even trying to fight it anymore.”

“Of course he is!” Rey snapped. “Do you think he _likes_ being chained up in a madhouse?”

“No, I don’t. Which is why he’ll eventually give into Kylo Ren and let the demon free them both.”

Rey wanted to shake him.

“You don’t know that!” Her voice rang clear through the corridors, bouncing her anger back to her. “You’re not giving him a chance!”

“A chance to what? Burn down another home? Destroy the lives of even more people?” Father Luke looked at her in contempt. “Did you think snatching your veil from your head was the worst Kylo Ren can do? He has been _toying_ with you. Any day now, he will become strong enough to take over Ben for good. What do you think will happen to you then?”

Rey wanted to protest that Kylo wouldn’t hurt her, but she knew that was vanity. He found her intriguing, but that wouldn’t spare her life in the long run. She wasn’t foolish enough to think otherwise.

Father Luke nodded, taking her silence as a sign of her defeat. He covered his mouth and let his hand drop through his beard.

“You are forbidden from returning to Korriban,” he murmured, his resolve solidifying with each word. “I will tell the orderlies here. Ben will be moved in the morning.”

Horror drowned Rey’s anger.

“You can’t do that.” She couldn’t leave Ben alone in his misery. She couldn’t leave Kylo alone without knowing the truth about her parents. “Please, you can’t do that. He needs me.”

“I am trying to protect you, Rey!” Father Luke snapped. “I never should have agreed to involve you in the first place.”

“But you did,” Rey pressed. “I _am_ involved. Don’t be so cruel as to take this away from me.”

Father Luke was quiet for so long that she thought she had worn him down. When he spoke, it was with grim finality.

“One day, you will understand.”

It was a fraught, silent ride back to Sister Maz’s.


	5. there's too much pain to come

Rey stole away from the Home a few hours after the sun set. She knew what she had to do. There was no way she could live with herself if she knew that Ben was out there somewhere, struggling and alone, and she hadn’t even tried to help him.

The walk to Korriban was a simple one, through a small town and across some fields, yet it still took her over an hour to reach the asylum. The deep darkness of the night did nothing to soothe her fear. If Ben accepted her offer to run away, she might never see Sister Maz or any of the orphans again. She was leaving behind everything she had ever known on the chance that she could form something real with a possessed man.

Rey climbed over Korriban’s wrought iron gates, huffing with exertion. Her mind wandered as she searched for a ground-floor window to steal in through. Ben had wealthy parents who supposedly loved him. They might not look too kindly on him for breaking out of an asylum with a nobody orphan in tow, but Rey decided that was a worry for another day. Hopefully the Skywalker legacy included some empty homes they could hide away in until they figured out their next move.

She was fully prepared to smash a window and deal with the consequences later, but the first window she pushed at opened beneath her shove. She decided to take that as a sign that she was doing the right thing, instead of acknowledging the truth that security at Korriban could afford to be lax. All of its inmates were chained down, and anyone who tried to break into the asylum was madder than those within it.

The halls of Korriban were less pristine by night. Only alternate corridors were lit, casting the white tiles at the end of each hall into shadows. Rey crept along, hardly daring to breathe. Occasionally, a scream would ring out. Despite all the reminders that she was not alone, she had never felt so isolated. More than once, tears pricked her eyes. She swallowed them down with determination and kept on walking.

The fact that she didn’t see a single watchman patrolling only strengthened Rey’s belief that she was supposed to save Ben Solo. If only whatever higher power was easing her passage had also given her a map to the guards’ office. It took her far too long to find it, each minute stretching into a lifetime of fear that she would be caught.

Faint music from the wireless drifted out from the office. Light shone through the bars over the glass windows. Rey peered through them, careful to stay low. A single guard sat at a desk, his head tipped back and his mouth opened. He was fast asleep. A set of keys rested from a hook behind him. The largest key hung below the others like a beacon. The skeleton key.

Again, Rey pushed aside her unease at how simply her plan was going. She slipped into the office, only taking her eyes away from the snoring guard for long enough to slide all the keys from their hook. One of them was bound to open Ben’s shackles. Just as silently, she slipped back out. At least she knew the way to Ben’s room from the office. She stayed on hyper-alert as she half-ran through the corridors, trying to make her footfalls as light as possible.

Holding her breath as though it would make the sound of the lock clicking any quieter, Rey twisted the key and pushed the door open. The light of the moon shone in through the windows, illuminating Ben’s figure as he sat up and peered through the dimness.

“Rey?”

Rey closed the door behind her. Now that she was finally at her destination, her adrenaline was beginning to fade. She felt pathetic. Single-minded determination had brought her this far but left her no room to consider Ben’s thoughts. What if everything she had built up between them existed only in her mind?

“Father Luke wants to send you away,” she said, turning around and striding to Ben’s side. “I’m here to free you. If you want to come with me.”

Her feelings of inadequacy rose the longer Ben stayed silent. By the time he finally frowned and shook his head, she was ready to sink into the floor.

“Why would my uncle send me away?” he asked, sounding for all the world like a child.

Rey braced herself for the pain of revealing something so horrible.

“Kylo destroyed the seminary because Father Luke was about to kill you.”

Pain flashed across Ben’s face, but still he wouldn’t face the truth.

“He wouldn’t—no, he wouldn’t do that.”

Rey wanted to reach out and hold his hand. She wanted to ease him through his bewilderment.

“He thinks you can’t fight the darkness,” she said gently. “But I know that you can. Come with me.”

“Where?”

“Anywhere. Anywhere but here.”

Rey held her breath as she waited for Ben’s answer.

_Please_, she thought. _Please._

When he finally nodded, Rey felt light and energized. She grinned at him, unable to put her gratitude into words. Her hands shook as she held the bundle of keys up to the moonlight. Aside from the large skeleton key, there was nothing to distinguish them from each other. Rey took a breath and let her intuition flow. She picked a key at random and slotted it into Ben’s cuffs.

It fit.

Instead of joy or triumph, Rey only felt foreboding. Still, she unlocked the manacles and Ben’s wrists and ankles. Ben was on his feet as his cuffs fell to the ground with a resounding clang. Rey winced, but before she could voice the worry that someone had heard, Ben wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her closer. A moment later, his lips were warm against hers.

Rey melted. She finally understood that undefinable sense of home. Ben held her like she was something precious. Unlike Kylo’s threatening bulk, Ben’s body promised security and protection. She huddled into him, desperate to fulfil that vow. When he pulled away, she tried not to cry out. His smile, wide and genuine, pacified her.

“We’ll have time for that later,” Ben said, kissing her on her nose. “For now—”

The cell door opened. Rey cursed beneath her breath. She knew the sound of Ben’s cuffs falling away couldn’t have gone unnoticed. She had finally pushed her luck too far. A hundred excuses flitted through her mind in the time it took her to turn to the stunned orderly in the doorway.

Ben was already striding over to the man. Before the orderly had the chance to speak, Ben wrapped his arm around the man’s neck the same way he had wrapped it around Rey’s waist. With a swift, violent motion, he broke the orderly’s neck. The sick snapping sound was followed by a dull thud as the body fell to the floor.

Rey’s mouth dropped open, but the only sound she managed was a strangled gasp.

Ben quickly walked back over to her. His expression still held its warmth from when he had smiled at her. He held out his hand.

“Let’s go.”

Rey didn’t move. Her breaths were too loud in the silence of the room. There was a dead body before her. A dead body put there by Ben.

_Was_ it Ben? Rey lifted her gaze from the orderly to the man who had killed him. Ben Solo might not have been capable of such an act, but there was certainly something within him that was.

“Kylo?” she asked, in the same bewildered tone that Ben had adopted earlier when learning about his uncle.

Ben tilted his head, confused. His eyebrows drew together.

“What? No, Rey, it’s me. Ben.”

Rey only stared. It was true that the man before her had Ben’s soft eyes, and Ben’s aura, but his actions were more suited to the demon inside of him.

“You killed him,” she whispered.

“I had to,” Ben soothed. “He would have stopped us. Now, come on.”

He offered his hand out further. Hope clung to him. Rey took a step back, away from him, away from the man he had murdered, away from the future she had dreamed of.

“You _killed_ him.”

Ben took his hand back and ran it through his hair, frustrated.

“You can’t live with something evil inside of you and stay pure,” he said.

It was only now, seeing him building up to anger, that Rey realised what a threat he could be. She wouldn’t be able to fight him off if he decided to attack her, or if—God forbid—he decided that being told no didn’t matter to him.

She took a moment to just breathe. She couldn’t give up on Ben. That was all anyone had ever done, and she didn’t want to join the ranks of the likes of Father Luke.

“I don’t need you to be pure,” she said, willing him to understand. “I just need you to be good.”

“I’m still a good person.”

He didn’t sound convinced. Rey felt tears start to choke her again. She had already lost her faith in so many things. She didn’t want to lose it in Ben, too.

“Prove it,” she said, an idea forming as she spoke. “Let me banish Kylo. I was holding back because of the things he promised to tell me, but I can let all of that go if it means trading it for a future with you.”

For the first time, Ben seemed afraid.

“Ben?” Rey pressed. “Let me banish him.”

Ben shook his head. He wouldn’t meet her eyes.

“He’s a part of me,” he mumbled. “He’s been in my head all my life. I don’t know who I am without him.”

Rey wanted to move to him, to comfort him. The dead body felt like it had been chained to her ankles, rooting her to the spot.

“You’re Ben,” she said.

“Ben is nothing without Kylo.”

“That isn’t true.” How had things gone so wrong so quickly? Rey’s voice shook. “Please, Ben. Please don’t go this way.”

Ben averted his eyes. He seemed deep in thought. Rey thought she had finally broken through to him, and then—

“Kylo called you a witch.”

Rey’s stomach twisted.

“How did you—?”

“You’re not.” Ben’s voice was too soft for the cruelties it carried. “You want to know who your parents were, Rey? They were drunks. They indebted themselves to a gang and left you behind as collateral. When they didn’t return, the gang members dropped you off at Sister Maz’s.”

Rey’s tears slid down her cheeks. Her breaths shuddered in the silence. That was it, then. Her hopes for her past dead, her hopes for her future dying.

“There’s your mystical, mysterious history,” Ben continued, still quiet. “I don’t know where your power comes from, but you aren’t strong enough to banish a demon. Don’t even try.”

She might have broken down from the sorrow of it, if not for Ben’s tone. He was gentle, sympathetic even, as if he was saying and doing such terrible things for her benefit.

Heartbreak hardened Rey. She couldn’t let all of this be for nothing. With a snarl, she launched herself at Ben. As they fell to the floor entwined, she poured all of her fervor into him. Her insistences of _calm_ mixed with orders to _get out_ and strong declarations of _unwanted, unneeded, abomination_.

In the space of a blink, she was back in the white room in Ben’s mind.

She straightened up, gasping from exertion, and looked around. The walls had gaping holes burning through them, revealing a black abyss beyond. Flames were created constantly, eating away at the mindspace.

“What did you do?” Kylo cried, cowering from each new spark.

Rey made to move towards him, but each effort was stopped by a new jet of fire bursting from the floor or the walls. She snarled and tried to leap over the flames, but her limbs were leaden.

“Ben doesn’t want you here,” Kylo sneered. He looked like a caged animal. “You’re nobody. You’re _nothing_. When I get out, I will find you and make you _beg_.”

Ben’s mind threw her out. The image of Kylo, spitting with rage and fear, burned into her mind. It was all she saw as she slowly came around, realising she was tucked in Ben’s arms on the cold tiled floor. Sadness gripped her, but it would do her no kindnesses to pretend she was being embraced. She untangled herself from his strong arms and slowly got to her feet.

Everything ached.

Rey groaned and looked down. Even unconscious, Ben didn’t look at peace. Sweat beaded his brow and his mouth turned down at the edges. Rey glanced at the cuffs still on the floor, taking precious seconds deliberating her next move. She couldn’t waste the time it would take in her weakened state to lug Ben’s body over to his bed and chain him there.

She grabbed the keys and fled, making sure to lock the door behind her.

* * *

The news that Korriban had burned down in the night didn’t shake Rey as much as it should have done.

The sounds of breakfast faded around her as she read and reread the newspaper. The headline reported of upwards of fifty deaths, but she knew that one name would be absent from all the reports.

Kylo wouldn’t let Ben die, not after all the demon had done to keep him as his vessel. The two were entwined more tightly than ever. Quite where that left Rey, she didn’t know. Kylo was furious with her, and for once Ben would be in complete agreement with his demon. 

_Ben chose to stay in the darkness,_ Rey told herself sternly, as though the words would drown out the pain in her chest. _You can’t build a future with a damned man._

She quieted the wistful thought to the contrary. The next time she saw Ben - if she ever saw him again - he would not have white picket fences in mind. It probably wasn’t safe for her to stay at Sister Maz’s Home with a spurned almost-lover and a literal demon on the loose.

If only she had somewhere else to go.


End file.
